The Enduring Value of a Long Sermon Series

Read this blog post entitled “The Enduring Value of a Long Sermon Series” at the Reformation 21 website.

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But Pastor…Why Preach a Longer Sermon Series on the Book of Job?

(1)   Spiritual gains take place during hard seasons of suffering.

All the giants of the Christian faith testify that it is precisely in the dark night of the soul and in seasons of suffering that God transforms our lives and produces lasting fruit that lasts unto eternity.

As C.S. Lewis so eloquently put it, “Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

(2)   Everyone suffers. Either now or later, you will suffer.

The apostle Peter counsels, “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you” (1 Peter 4:12). Peter’s admonition seems to imply that Christians should “ready themselves” for the day when suffering arrives on their doorstep.

Yet, truth be told, American Christians are last in the entire known world for knowing how to suffer in steadfast faith and with resolute hope as Christians.

We are some of the least resilient and fiercest complaining Christians on the planet. If any group of Christians on earth needs to hear the message of Job, it is American Christians who, relative to the rest of the world, live in the lap of luxury, convenience, and comfort.

(3)   Suffering is a problem that won’t go away for the Christian.

The British novelist Muriel Spark once argued that the problem of Job is “the only problem, in fact, worth discussing”. Suffering is often called “the bedrock of atheism”, the quintessential thorn in the flesh of Christianity.

If we truly want to model a faithful witness to Jesus Christ, we need do it both intellectually and personally. Intellectually, we need to be prepared for the apologetic question of suffering (i.e. “Why does a good God allow horrendous evil in our world?”). Personally, we need to be able to tell our story authentically, without leaving out the hard parts of our lives. In other words, we need to be able to share where God has met us in the broken places of our lives.

Today in America, we need less human-centered preachers of self-empowerment and more preachers heralding the hard edges of our faith for the good of our witness and for the health of our churches.